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UPI) -- President Nicolas Sarkozy of France says he wants to see victory in Afghanistan but has no plans to send more French troops to that country. Speaking to the Le Figaro newspaper, the French leader said he believes there should be a build-up of more Afghan troops, CNN reported. As for staying on in Afghanistan, Sarkozy told the newspaper: "I answer yes -- and stay to win. "But France will not send one more soldier," he added. "My belief is that more Afghan soldiers are needed. It is them who will be the most efficient to win this war...

When ten French soldiers were killed last year in an ambush by Afghan insurgents in what had seemed a relatively peaceful area, the French public were horrified. Their revulsion increased with the news that many of the dead soldiers had been mutilated — and with the publication of photographs showing the militants triumphantly sporting their victims’ flak jackets and weapons. The French had been in charge of the Sarobi area, east of Kabul, for only a month, taking over from the Italians; it was one of the biggest single losses of life by Nato forces in Afghanistan. What the grieving...

French marines aboard trawlers in the Indian Ocean Saturday fired on pirates to repel a dawn attack, as two vessels used in the attack were subsequently captured by Seychelles coastguards, sources said. "Three small launches... (which were) nearly invisible and that we had on the radar at the last moment, chased us," a member of the crew of the Drennac, one of two fishing vessels approached by the pirates, told AFP by telephone. The French military said the marines had first fired flares then "warning shots in the air and across the bows of the pirates' boats", before finally, when...

The head of the French military says military intervention is not a viable option to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear capability.

Just as President Jacques Chirac was vehemently arguing against invading Iraq in late 2002, General Philippe Rondot wrote that he had been given the green light to "recover" top officials including Tariq Aziz, Saddam's foreign minister. Previously unseen extracts of Gen Rondot's private diaries were reprinted in the newspaper Libération. In a passage dated Dec 3, 2002, the general refers to an "agreement in principle to 'recover' if necessary Mr Aziz and Al-Rafai" – said to be a senior Ba'ath Party politician. The two men were believed to have been considered useful to the French while Gen Rondot knew Aziz...

French Aircraft Carrier Sails Without Nukes The French nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle with air wing on deck. By Hans M. Kristensen France no longer deploys nuclear weapons on its aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle under normal circumstances but stores the weapons on land, according to French officials. President Nicolas Sarkozy declared in March 2008 that France “could and should be more transparent with respect to its nuclear arsenal than anyone ever has been.” But while the other nuclear powers declared long ago that their naval weapons were offloaded or scrapped after the Cold War ended, a similar announcement...

Bombing exercise 'caused fires' Dozens of homes destroyed Authorities angry at military MILITARY bombing practice has caused one of France's worst fires for three years which continues to rage on the eastern outskirts of Marseille. The fire has burnt dozens of homes but claimed no victims. The wildfire was caused by military practice shelling which hit the eastern Trois-Ponts suburb of the southern city forcing the evacuation of scores of residents. "There are a few dozen houses burnt in the Trois-Ponts district but there are no victims," fire brigade spokesman Samuel Champon said. "There are more homes threatened than vehicles...

The French Army were branded ‘imbeciles’ today after an artillery exercise caused a massive fire which destroyed dozens of houses and left hundreds homeless. Rather than improving the marksmanship of the Foreign Legion, the shelling led to mass evacuations in a suburb of Marseilles.

(Planes flew a distance equivalent to flying to the moon and back 63 times) Ceremonies have been taking place in Berlin to mark the 60th anniversary of the ending of the blockade of West Berlin by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. In 1948, Stalin cut off all land links into West Berlin in an attempt to force out British, French and US troops. Instead, the Western nations launched the biggest airlift in history to keep 2.25 million residents from starving. For the next 11 months, planes landed every two minutes, bringing in total more than 2.5m tonnes of supplies. Seventy-eight aircrew...

Fourteen suspected Somali pirates have been captured in separate operations by a French frigate and the Seychelles coast guard. French commandos on the frigate Nivose caught 11 suspects some 900 kms (560 miles) off the Somali coast, the French Defence Ministry says. The Nivose is reported to have alerted the Seychelles authorities to help them capture the other three. Somali pirates are currently holding nearly 20 ships for ransom. On Saturday a Greek-owned ship with a Ukrainian crew was hijacked by Somali pirates south-west of the Seychelles, a seafarers' group says. On the same day a Portuguese warship thwarted an...

French naval forces have detained 11 suspected pirates after raiding a pirate "mother ship" in the Indian Ocean, French military officials said Wednesday. The French forces had been responding to a distress call from a Liberian cargo ship that was being attacked by pirates using rocket-propelled grenades and small-arms fire. A French military helicopter reached the scene, then reportedly followed the two small pirate skiffs back to a 30-foot boat apparently being used as a base for the pirates. French forces from the Nivose — part of a European Union anti-piracy task force — then raided the larger boat, seizing...

A French warship has captured 11 pirates off the coast of Kenya, amid calls for the international community to deal with the problem of piracy. The pirates were captured by a warship from an EU piracy patrol, hours after a failed attack on a US ship. News of the incidents came as the UN special envoy for Somalia said the attacks threatened international peace. He urged financial backers of the "bandits", as he called them, to be identified and held accountable. The latest attack involved pirates firing rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons at a US-flagged cargo ship, the Liberty Sun,...

A FRENCH warship patrolling waters off East Africa as part of an EU anti-piracy force has intercepted a pirate "mother ship" and arrested 11 gunmen, the French defence ministry said. The frigate chased the pirates 500 nautical miles (926km) east of the Kenyan coast after tracking them overnight from the scene of a failed attack on a Liberian-registered vessel, a spokesman said. "The pirates were sailing a 10m mother ship carrying 17 drums holding 200 litres of fuel each and two assault skiffs," he said, adding that after the overnight interception the captives were being held on board the French...

In admission that will cast fresh doubts over the controversial decision to free Florent Lemacon and four other hostages by force, defence minister Herve Morin said he could not rule out the possibility that he had been hit by a French commando's bullet. "There will be a judicial inquiry and therefore an autopsy," he told French radio. "One cannot exclude that during the exchange of fire between the pirates and commandos the shot was French," Mr Morin spoke out as the piracy crisis on the Indian Ocean escalated yet further, with yet more vessels attacked and no sign of an...

A French military operation to free a yacht hijacked by Somali pirates backfired today when one of the hostages was killed, highlighting the perils facing US forces trying to free an American seaman being held captive in a parallel pirate standoff. Four French hostages, including a three-year-old child, were rescued on board the Tanit, which was hijacked en route to Zanzibar last weekend. Two pirates also died in the raid, according to president Nicolas Sarkozy's office. Despite the death of one of the hostages, the French government stood by the commando-style tactics – which they have used before – and...

NDJAMENA (AFP) - European peacekeepers were hunting for a "deranged" French Foreign Legion officer who fled after going on a shooting spree in Chad, killing two comrades, a Togolese UN soldier and a farmer. The shootings began Tuesday at Camp des Etoiles, the main base of the European peacekeepers near the airport in the eastern town of Abeche near the Sudan border, a French military official said. "Gunshots were heard in the (military) camp and then the two legionnaires were found and then a little further away the body of the Togolese soldier was discovered," said Captain Christophe Prazuck. The...

French warship Sunday foiled attempts by Somalian pirates in the Gulf of Aden to seize two cargo vessels and intercepted 19 people, the French president's office said. "Three days after a French vessel thwarted an attack on a Panamanian cargo ship" the frigate Jean de Vienne conducted a "decisive action" against "two new attacks" it said in a statement. "The 19 Somali pirates who tried to seize the two boats were intercepted," it added, saying they carried weapons, ammunition and material for boarding ships. ...

DICKEY: Some Americans call the French “surrender monkeys.” JONES: France has probably the most expeditionary army [i.e., ready to deploy to distant battlefields] in Europe. And writ large. They have impressive military capabilities across the whole spectrum of operations. They’re good at peacekeeping; their Air Force is modern, state of the art; their Navy is modern; their land Army I know about because I served with them in northern Iraq 11 years ago, and I know their generals–this is a very, very fine army.

“We have shared our daily life with two US units for quite a while - they are the first and fourth companies of a prestigious infantry battalion whose name I will withhold for the sake of military secrecy. To the common man it is a unit just like any other. But we live with them and got to know them, and we henceforth know that we have the honor to live with one of the most renowned units of the US Army - one that the movies brought to the public as series showing “ordinary soldiers thrust into extraordinary events”....

hockingly positive views of our forces in Afghanistan are revealed in this translation of a post by a French OMLT (Operational Mentoring Liaison Teams) infantryman working with our toops there. A couple of brief excerpts: Heavily built, fed at the earliest age with Gatorade, proteins and creatine - they are all heads and shoulders taller than us and their muscles remind us of Rambo. Our frames are amusingly skinny to them - we are wimps, even the strongest of us - and because of that they often mistake us for Afghans. [....] Each man knows he can count on the...

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) -- Tensions heated up on the high seas, as the French Navy captured nine pirates near the Gulf of Aden and a Somali pirate warned Thursday that the crew of a hijacked Ukrainian arms ship would be killed if NATO forces attacked. The French Navy intercepted the pirates in two small boats about 115 miles (185 kilometers) from the nearest coast, finding assault rifles, grenade-launchers, grappling hooks and ladders onboard. The nine were handed over Thursday to Somali officials, and French officials received assurances the prisoners would be treated according to international conventions. "We wanted to send...

The "secret" file quoted by a Canadian newspaper said that the French troops ambushed on Aug 18 in a valley east of Kabul did not have enough bullets, radios and other equipment to sustain them through two days of fighting. The report is likely to fan tensions ahead of a French parliamentary debate over President Nicolas Sarkozy's decision to send extra troops to Afghanistan. It promises to be heated, but Mr Sarkozy's decision will be approved as his ruling centre-right UMP party holds a strong majority.

A picture of a Taliban fighter in the uniform of a dead French soldier drew anger in France Wednesday as the army came under new fire over its conduct in an ambush that killed 10 paratroopers in Afghanistan last month.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Thursday pledged to continue the fight in Afghanistan while attending a state funeral in Paris for the 10 French soldiers killed in a Taliban ambush earlier in the week. Sarkozy, who was accompanied by other French leaders at the funeral ceremony in a church at Les Invalides, said France will not give up its fight against terrorism in Afghanistan "We don't have the right to lose over there, we cannot renounce our values," he said. "We cannot let the barbarians triumph because a defeat at the other side of the world will be paid for...

An emotional President Sarkozy insisted yesterday that there would be no French wobble over Afghanistan, urging troops in Kabul to fight with fresh resolve after the loss of ten comrades. Mr Sarkozy, pale and shaken after inspecting the coffins of the young French servicemen, voiced his defiance after the wisdom of his decision to send more troops into what is widely seen as an unwinnable war was called into question. François Hollande, the Socialist Party leader, said that France “must be told what exactly our soldiers are doing in Afghanistan and how long they will be doing it for”. Survivors...

France reacted in shock on Wednesday to the death of 10 of its soldiers in an ambush in Afghanistan and questions began to be asked about the country's worst military loss in 25 years. President Nicolas Sarkozy, who flew to Kabul on Tuesday, said France was committed to its engagement in Afghanistan where it took part in the 2001 invasion to topple the Taliban. But the opposition Socialists called for a parliamentary committee to meet and doubts were expressed about the official account of the incident in which the 10 soldiers were killed and 21 wounded in a fierce mountain...

France's President Nicolas Sarkozy shakes hands with Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai at the presidential palace in Kabul August 20, 2008. President Sarkozy said on Wednesday he had no regrets about sending 700 more troops to Afghanistan, after insurgents killed 10 French soldiers, the biggest single loss for foreign forces in combat since 2001. REUTERS/Olivier Laban-Mattei/Pool (AFGHANISTAN)

<p>President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Wednesday he had no regrets about sending 700 more troops to Afghanistan, after insurgents killed 10 French soldiers, the biggest single loss for foreign forces in combat since 2001.</p> <p>The troops were killed in a major battle that erupted when Taliban insurgents ambushed a French patrol just 60 km (40 miles) east of the Afghan capital on Monday. The fighting has heightened fears the militants are gradually closing in on Kabul itself.</p>

President Nicolas Sarkozy has arrived in Afghanistan to support French troops a day after one of the deadliest attacks on France's forces abroad. Ten French soldiers were killed and 21 injured in an ambush by Taleban fighters east of the capital, Kabul. Mr Sarkozy said France was committed to the fight against terrorism, and the mission in Afghanistan would continue.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 19, 2008 – Ten French soldiers were killed in Afghanistan when their patrol was attacked by Taliban fighters in Kabul province during fighting that spanned from late yesterday until early today, U.S. officials said. Twenty-one other French troops were wounded in the engagement, which reportedly involved up to 100 insurgents, according to a NATO news release. Afghan security forces were with the French soldiers when enemy fighters attacked. “As I understand it, it was a complex attack involving multiple weapons systems, small arms, mortars, rockets, and [it] lasted for several hours,” senior Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told reporters...

Ten French soldiers have been killed in fighting with the Taleban east of the Afghan capital, Kabul, Afghan and French sources say. The deaths come amid heavy fighting near Kabul after Nato said one of its patrols was ambushed.

KABUL (AFP) - Ten French soldiers were killed in battles with the Taliban near the Afghan capital, a French presidency source said Tuesday, as troops thwarted a second attack on a key US military base in as many days. Military officials in Kabul said the fierce clashes started with an attack Monday on an International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) patrol in Sarobi district, about 50 kilometres (30 miles) east of the capital Kabul. The French source, who requested anonymity, said the soldiers were killed following a "Taliban ambush". Most of the 3,000 French troops participating in the 40-nation ISAF are...

Kuwait has activated its Emergency War Plan after an armada of US naval battle groups headed for the Persian Gulf, Middle East Times reports. The report comes after DEBKAfiles claimed on Monday that the USS Theodore Roosevelt, the USS Ronald Reagan, and the USS Iwo Jima are sailing toward the Persian Gulf to reinforce the US strike forces in the region. The US naval force is accompanied by a British Royal Navy carrier battle group and a French nuclear hunter-killer submarine. The deployment is believed to be the largest naval task force assembled by the United States and its allies...

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Leaders from Europe, the Middle East and North Africa have been attending France's Bastille Day military parade.

CARCASSONNE, France (AFP) — President Nicolas Sarkozy promised swift and severe punishment Monday after a soldier shot and wounded 17 people, including a three-year-old boy and both his parents, at an open day at an army barracks. The sergeant opened up with an assault rifle, firing live rounds instead of blanks into a crowd of hundreds of visitors watching a hostage-taking exercise Sunday at the base near the southwestern city of Carcassonne. A man who witnessed the shooting told AFP that "suddenly, people were falling, we thought it was part of the exercise, and then we saw blood."

France will leave Britain alone in Europe's military "premier league" if President Nicolas Sarkozy's defence reforms go through, a group of senior officers has warned. In an anonymous letter, the officers from across the armed services slammed France's new defence doctrine, outlined by Mr Sarkozy this week, which calls for 54,000 military and civilian defence job cuts in return for investment in intelligence and hi-tech equipment. "We are abandoning European military leadership to the British, when we know their particular relationship with the United States," wrote the group calling itself Surcouf – the name of a legendary French corsair who...

France to rejoin NATO command From correspondents in Paris June 17, 2008 08:36pm Article from: Agence France-Presse PRESIDENT Nicolas Sarkozy today confirmed that France will soon rejoin NATO's military command that it left in 1966 but said its nuclear forces would remain under strict national control. "We can renew our relations with NATO without fearing for our independence and without the risk of being unwillingly dragged into a war," said Mr Sarkozy in an address on his new defence strategy.

Most of France's tanks, helicopters and jet fighters are unusable and its defence apparatus is on the verge of "falling apart", it has emerged. France's military has been given a bleak prognosis according to confidential defence documents leaked to the French press, less than half of France's Leclerc tanks – 142 out of 346 – are operational and even these regularly break down. Less than half of its Puma helicopters, 37 per cent of its Lynx choppers and 33 per cent of its Super Frelon models – built 40 years ago – are in a fit state to fly, according...

French army falling apart, documents show By Henry Samuel in Paris Last Updated: 10:50PM BST 06/06/2008 Most of France's tanks, helicopters and jet fighters are unusable and its defence apparatus is on the verge of "falling apart", it has emerged. France's military has been given a bleak prognosis According to confidential defence documents leaked to the French press, less than half of France's Leclerc tanks – 142 out of 346 – are operational and even these regularly break down. Less than half of its Puma helicopters, 37 per cent of its Lynx choppers and 33 per cent of its Super...

In the past few months, French President Nicolas Sarkozy has announced the first French military base in the Middle East, christened his country's costliest nuclear submarine and advocated returning troops to NATO command. Sarkozy's efforts to project the image of a militarily powerful France reasserting itself on the global security stage mask a behind-the-scenes struggle over withering defense budgets that threaten to reduce combat-ready forces by as much as 40 percent, sideline major new weapons programs and eliminate bases in Africa. Philippe Moreau Defarges, an analyst at the French Institute of International Relations, described Sarkozy's public pronouncements as "mostly an...

Two hundred years after the battle of Trafalgar, the navy could end up sharing the pride of its fleet with the French. Driven by spiralling budgets, the two navies began talks last week aimed at sharing their aircraft carriers. The government is expected to give the go-ahead for the Royal Navy’s two new aircraft carriers this week, part of a joint Anglo-French project to build a total of three. The French, who currently have only one carrier, the Charles de Gaulle, are questioning whether they can afford a replacement and are keen to explore closer co-operation with Britain instead. “We...

Six Somali men involved in capturing a French yacht and holding its 30 crew hostage have said they were part of a maritime militia group with a written code of conduct... The men were captured in the Somali desert by French troops on Friday after holding the yacht and its crew off Somalia for a week and fleeing with part of the ransom, which was recovered. They were flown to France this week to face trial. The yacht's captain told investigators the ransom paid was $2 million (1 million pounds). But the half-dozen men are just part of a larger...

SOMALIA: 6 PIRATES ARRESTED AFTER THE SEIZURE OF "PONANT" (AGI) - Paris, 11 April. - Some of the pirates who took part in the seizure of the French yacht "Ponant" off Somalia were arrested soon after the freeing of 30 members of the crew who had been taken hostage. This statement was released by the General Jean-Louis Goergelin of the French armed forces. The arrest of six pirates took place one hour after the release of the hostages, once the thirty members of the crew were landed. The six pirates were held aboard a French ship.

PARIS (Reuters) - French commandos seized six pirates in Somalia on Friday during a daring helicopter raid launched shortly after the bandits had released the 30-strong crew of a luxury yacht hijacked last week. French officials said the owners of the yacht paid a ransom to obtain the freedom of the crew and as soon as it was clear that they were all safe, the commandos went into action aboard helicopters to track down the pirates. A district commissioner in Somalia told Reuters that five local people had died in the attack, but the French military denied killing anyone in...

KABUL (AFP) — More than 2,000 US marines recently deployed in Afghanistan to support a NATO-led military campaign against Islamic rebels have began operations in the country's restive south, the unit said Thursday. The 2,300-strong US Marine Expeditionary Unit was part of Washington's recent contribution to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) efforts to quell a resurgent Taliban insurgency. "The last of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit's Marines and Sailors are arriving and the unit is beginning operations after weeks of flowing personnel and equipment here," the unit said in a statement. "The Marines have begun their operations in...

PARIS — Elite French troops were headed to East Africa to bolster efforts to free captives of a yacht held by pirates off Somalia, a French Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said today. A team of the GIGN, a commando force that conducts anti-terrorist and hostage rescue operations, was being sent to Djibouti to "reinforce" negotiation teams in place, spokeswoman Pascale Andreani said in an online briefing. Pirates seized the yacht, called Le Ponant, in the Gulf of Aden on Friday. It was carrying 30 crew members, including 22 French citizens, but no passengers. French officials made contact with the pirates overnight....

The Le Ponant pleasure yacht was seized Friday in international waters opposite Somalia without passengers on route from the Seychelles to Aden Port and the Mediterranean after its first pleasure trip of the summer season in the Indian Ocean. The 32-man crew was taken hostage. Our shipping correspondent reports that the French Le Commandant Rouen warship was diverted from NATO’s Afghanistan operation to join the Yemeni coast guard in the hunt for and rescue of the captured craft. The Le Ponant caters to 64 high-profile luxury tourists, one of three owned by Le Compagnie Des Iles du Ponant, a...

France has agreed to deploy a battalion of new troops to Afghanistan, a NATO spokesperson announced Wednesday. The Prime Minister's Office confirmed with CTV News that French President Nicolas Sarkozy has offered a battalion of soldiers -- normally around 700-800 troops -- to be deployed to the eastern region of Afghanistan. The announcement comes from just before the opening of a NATO leaders summit in Bucharest, Romania. "And the Americans, we are told by the PMO, have agreed to boost their resources as well," reported CTV's Graham Richardson in Bucharest. The U.S. troops, expected to number 1,000, are expected to...

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has said he will send more troops to Afghanistan to support Nato's mission. Mr Sarkozy, who is on a state visit to Britain, said he would make the offer at next week's Nato summit in the Romanian capital, Bucharest. Nato leaders have frequently called on member countries to contribute more soldiers to the mission in Afghanistan. The Nato-led International Security and Assistance Force (Isaf) currently has over 43,000 personnel in Afghanistan. In a speech to the British parliament in London, Mr Sarkozy said defeat to Taleban insurgents was not an option. "In Afghanistan something essential is...